When I was Wonderland
by Gothic Wonderland
Summary: When a girl wakes up in the hospital with selective amnesia, all she can remember is that someone is trying to kill her. Her mind copes with lost memories by putting her into a Wonderland-like world where all her friends and family are characters from Lewis Carrolls Alice in Wonderland.
1. Prologue

Prologue

I fade in and out of consciousness. My eyes wont open, but sometimes I hear snatches of conversation. The pain is too bad. I sink back into the blackness again. I dream…

I'm running through a field and the sun shines brightly overhead. I'm wearing a light blue dress. I'm young. Mayhap 10 or so. My hair is in to braids that fly in the wind surrounding me. I hear someone calling me. He calls 'Icy! Where are you?'. I know the voice. A boy. A year or so older then me; if that. You wouldn't know he was older by observation though.

What's his name? It started with an R….

I turn and see him. 'Reggie!' I call.

Ah. That must be it. Reggie. How cute….

I look at the boy laughing. He is dressed as silly as ever. His blue shirt clashes with his bright purple pants and brown-orange jacket. His hat is over-sized and keeps slipping over his eyes as he runs to catch up with me. 'Icy! Lord your fast! Do you want to play?' There's a mischievous glint in his green eyes. You wouldn't see it unless you knew him as well as I do. 'Play what?' I giggle. Reggie always knows the best games. 'Truth or Dare?' He questions. 'Yes! Yes! I'm first this time though.' I reply…

My eyelids flutter open as I awake. I'm in a white room with a checkered floor. Where am I? There's no one there. I hear beeping and see a screen to my left covered in green lines. The lines go up each time the machine beeps. There are tubes all over me. Ugh! I tear them out immediately. Someone comes charging into the room. She looks regal, dressed completely in white. With out thinking about it I know who she is.

"Ivory! What am I doing here? What is this place? Are we still in Wonderland?" I demand.

"Sweet heart, my name is Katie. I'm your nurse. You've been in a coma for the last eight months. You fell off your cousin Liz's roof."

She has to be talking about Bill. He's the last of the Lizard family.

"He was trying to come get you with his ladder but—" Katie continued.

"Yes Bill always has his ladder." I break in. "Never leaves home without it. Runs in the family…"

"Ma'am do you know who you are?"

"Of course I do! My name is Alice Liddell."


	2. Chapter 1

Chapter 1

So many people are here. I don't know any of them. I think I recognize a few of the people. A large but not fat woman stands in the corner and I conclude this must be the Duchess. The Duchess is here with her slave and child. Gods that child really looks like a pig, even though the duchess herself is quite beautiful. The cooking slave is younger then I expected but still as skinny and dirty. I'm surprised that Bill the lizard didn't come seeing as it was his roof I apparently fell off of. Honestly, Bill. And Ivory thinks her name is Katie. She must have lost her Whispering Ribbons. Bill will have to make her another.

Another woman stands closer to me. She is accompanied by a man in his late forties who has one hand on her arm and one around her waist.

She is looking at me like I'm god, or like god was in this awful white room. Ivory comes up to me.

"Alice, dear, these are your parents." She tells me gently.

"What the crap are you saying?!" The woman yells. "Her name is—"

"Shh!" Ivory hushes her quickly.

They keep telling me that my name isn't Alice. But it is! That what Reggie said. Ive been remembering things. I've been remembering little things for the last few days. Everything is coming back to me. I remember their names. I see their faces in my mind. Their names their stories. I know them. And I know not to trust any of them. Each of them is looking for a way to get ride of me. They've been trying to my whole life. I don't know which one is behind it, but whoever they are, its their fault that I fell off Bill's roof and I have to find out who they are before they get me. The only ones I can trust are the tea party creatures. Reggie, March, and the Doormouse. But I cant find them. I haven't seen Reggie and them in a while…

I stand by my self in a room. Reggie strolls in holding his teacup and saucer. His hat is cocked to the side, and he hiccups occasionally. He's obviously had too much tea. He and March are the only ones in the world that can get drunk and positively wasted on the stuff. Honestly. His cheeks are flushed, and he walks slightly off kilter. He saunters up and throws his arms, tea still in hand, around my waist. He NEVER does this! He's never been this inebriated before. Not even for his birthday.

'I loooooovvvve youuuuuu!' He slurs.

'Reggie! Stop this nonsense. You're drunk. You need to go to sleep.'

'Nooooooooo! I won't go! Not unless y—hiccup—ou come with me.' He managed to get out. Grabbing my hand he pulls me upstairs to his room. He starts trying to get ready for bed. Stumbling around in his drunken state, it doesn't go well.

"Reggie, sit down on the bed. Let me do it."

Gently I remove his positively mad clothing. Off come the coat and hat I love so much landing on the chair by the bed. His bow tie falls to the blanket as I undo the top few buttons on his electric blue shirt. He nuzzles his overly large freckled button nose to mine. He kisses me sloppily on the cheek. Slowly his head slides to my neck.

He pulls me to him. One hand on my back and the other on my neck. His light caramel curls tickle my cheeks and forehead as our lips touch. Our kiss is short but firm. I break away.

'Reggie! What are you d—doing?' I stammer.

'Icy, I need you. I want you to be more then a friend. I'm so s—ick of being just your friend Reggie.' He says in disgust. 'I want everyone to know your mine. I'm done with guys treating you like you're nothing!' He almost sobs.

I'm shocked. How long has he felt like this? Why hasn't he said anything. I'm so shocked I say the first thing that comes to my mind.

'Reggie! I don't feel that way. I mean I care about you. I do. And my feelings for you are very strong, but, I—I just—I don't know if love like that is what I'm—' I stop suddenly at the devastated look I see on his face. Tears roll down his cheeks.

'But, I—I love you! And—and tea. You love tea. Just like I do! And you—you…don't?' He sobs. The last word is barely above a whisper.

'No Reginald, I don't feel that way about you right now. I'm not saying I never could…but I—' I'm cut off as he breaks away from me.

'F—fine!' He hiccups. 'I'm not going to keep around if you can't feel like that.'

'No Reggie! That's not what I—' I'm cut off as he door closes. I run into the kitchen. March sits at the long tea table sipping his tea quietly. Tears well up in my eyes as I realize that he's hear every word. We sit in silence for a minute or so.

'You oughtn't to have being so hastening in your words.' He says suddenly. His words are slightly jumbled as ever. But he's and mad as the rest of them. I've lived with him and Reggie long enough that I'm more or less able to make sense of them.

'You knowledge the he is one but only thing between your living and the Ovel man. If he being the lefting, then you must being in the dangerous.' He quirks an eyebrow at me.

'I know! But he….he said he loves me! What am I suppose to do March?! He's leaving! Right now! How can I make him stay?' I sob. If Reggie leaves then my life will be over more or less. Ive been receiving notes every week or so and the minute I find and read the note there is an attempt on my life. The paper always reads

Ready or not. Here I come.

Your truly,

Mr. Ovel

It makes no sense. But after a while we realized that Reggie being near me after I read the note saves me some how. Like the last time I got the note. I walked out of the coffee shop and found the note stuck to my latte. A bus came careening around the corner out of control. Then Reggie walked out behind me with his tea and the bus just stopped inches away from me.

'You could speak at him that you are in loving by him too…' March whispers gently.

'I do love him! But not like that….I don't know if I ever will.' I know what he is going to say even before the words are out.

'Then you cant making him to stay put.' He says putting his hands on my shoulders. Tears fill my eyes once more. Marchy pulls me in and holds me tight.

'Tut, tut, no time for tears. No no. Don't want to be a drowning tea party!'

We jump at the same time as the door slams. March sighs. Slowly I make my way to the window. Reggie is piling his things into his car. As his car pulls away I feel my heart break.

March went into hiding soon after Reggie left taking his cousin Dormouse with him. There have been six almost accidents since they left. Every time there is one I see a reflection of Reggie in something. When I fell off the roof I thought I saw his reflection in a window as fell. And I'm still alive. Someone wants me dead. I don't know who or why but they are skilled and have something that stops them if Reggie is there. But now he's gone and they almost got me.

Ivory tries to calm me as I get up.

"All of you! Get the hell out of my room! I don't know any of you. Go away!" I yell at all of them. The longer they are here the mor danger I'm in. I grab Ivory's white shirt. I whisper threateningly into her ear. "Get me Reggie! He's the only one I'll see. If you bring anyone that's not Reggie into this room again I'll get you fired."


	3. Chapter 2

Chapter 2

I was left alone for the next few days. Once or twice the doctors would come in to check my healing progression; they never said much, for which I was exceedingly grateful. I pass the long hours praying that they'll let me out soon. I'm not as injured as they think. I have not needed pain killers in two days now. Once a strange man came in without my permission. Ivory not longer attends me. A girl named Jane is in charge of the visitors. She's nice.

Tomorrow they're bringing a lady in to do some tests. They say she will decide where I'll go. They said there's a special place for people like me, or who have partial amnesia, whatever that is. I am so ready to leave this awful place where no one understands me they say I could leave is she says I'm better. I'm getting out!

Someone knocks at the door. Jane peeks her head inside.

"What?" I say. She looks like she's afraid I'll bite her head off if she speaks. Which I might. You know depending on what she has to say.

"You….ahem….have a…..erm…visitor…." She forces out.

I put my fingers to my temples in an almost useless attempt to cool my fiery temper.

"Jane, you know, very well I might add, how I feel about visitors of any kind. They are never welcome."

"I know that. But Katie…erm…Ivory said if the case that a certain young man came to see you…"

"…Reggie?" I whispered, curiously, not daring to hope that he had actually come.

"Well…you see—" she starts, but is cut off by the man silhouetted in the door way.

"Yoo'll recognize me lass. 'Ah havenae changed much since we…..parted." He said stepping into the light.

My heart stopped. I did recognize him. How could I not? I had spent the days, months, now for three years learning him. Memorizing every caramel colored curl, every laugh crease, and every sweet sun-kissed freckle on his beautiful face. I knew everything about him. How could I forget the most important person in my life. I never though I'd see him again, and now here he was. I had missed him so. But, I couldn't help but worry that he wasn't there to stay. Yes, "parted" was putting it lightly. So many emotions were plunging through my head.

"Reggie…." I whispered. I released the breathe that I didn't know I'd been holding.

"Aye lass. Et's me. 'Ah….ach….hoow yoo been? 'Ah herd ye fell." He said as Jane left.

"Yeah, its been a while now."

"'Ah know, 'ah came as soon as 'ah herd."

Did he? How could I be sure, I'd turned him down. I knew from experience that a body can only take a refusal like that so many times. If he had felt as strongly as I believed he had, then I was even more surprised that he was here at all. I don't know if I would be. My best friend left because he wasn't strong enough to pretend to not have feelings for me. I had made it impossible for him to be around me and be normal. How do act toward him? Is he here to stay or is he leaving now that he knows I'm okay?

"H-how… have you b-been?" I decide on the most neutral question ever. Ugh I can do this just breathe.

"O, 'Ah've been fine ah guess. Ah've been makin' it. Same as ever. Yoo know me."

"Yes, I do." Why couldn't I look him in the eye?! I have nothing to be ashamed of. He can fault me for anything. Can he?

"'Ah dannae blame you…." He whispered. "'Ah cannae fault ye fer yer feelings. 'Ah know that now."

Thank the Caterpillar. This was good news….wasn't it? If it's such good news then why do I feel like something is wrong? I push those feelings away. I'll analyze them later.

"I'm…..uh…glad…." Ugh. I'm glad. Not I'm not. I don't know what to say. I'm something. But whatever I am escapes me. "Um, how long are you staying? Do you know?" I look at my hands twisting in my blanket as I ask. Why cant I just speak my mind. This isn't hard.

"Ach, weel, Ah'll be stayin' fer a wee bit. Yoo know, tae make sure yoo are okay…and things…" he ran his fingers through his hair. The caramel curls stood up at an adorable angle, making him look a bit frazzled, like he'd just woken up.

"Do you want to sit?" I asked. "I can order in some chocolate mint tea…"

"Ye….ye remembered..." he said it so quietly that I barely heard him. "Aye. Aye, 'ah'd li'e that much…ach...a lot…." He blushed. "'Ah've been working on mah words, ye ken. Party words dannae always work in the world…. Haha." He laughed at himself.

"Have you seen Marchy?" A look of confusion crosses his face. "Your best friend, that is always with his cousin…?" His eyes light up.

"Ach, noo. No' fer a while noow."

Oh. I wonder if March left me for good as well as his friend.

We continue to talk to each other. Eventually we settle with ourselves. It's almost like he never left. We talk easily about everything that's happened since we parted. Soon enough we are laughing with each other. Jokes and stories come easy. He's been taking speech classes, he bought a coffee shop, that he calls the Tea Joint. He spends his days making and drinking tea. Anytime is tea time at the Tea Joint. He's happy. As he tells me about the café, his eyes light up like a child at Christmas. He uses his whole body to tell his story. I love this. Every minute spend with him makes my heart and mind sing with happiness. He's grown. He fills out his obnoxious orange coat now. With a bright green button up shirt, oversized shoes, and purple bow tie he looks great. Yes. If anyone could pull off an eccentric craziness he did. We talked until Jane came back.

"Time to go to sleep" she says. "I have your medicine."

"Ugh fine. But get out as soon as your done." I responded. I was so done with meds! I didn't even need them anymore.

Reggie and I watched as she put a needle into the tube coming out of my arm. She left promptly after. I looked at Reggie as I felt the serum start to take effect.

"Stay…please…" I drifted slowly away. I heard my self and I sounded far away. As I blacked out I whispered what I wanted to say the whole time. "I missed you, Reggie. Before you even pulled away…."


	4. Chapter 3

A/N:

 **Sorry it took so long to update. I've been having severe writers block. This chapter is from Reggie's POV and I've not only never written from a man's POV, I'm also not sure how they think. So don't review to harshly. Constructive reviews help though. I am open to suggestions as well.**

I was stunned. She missed me. I found myself gazing at her hair; the color of sunlight. But what was going on with her head? The doctor briefed me before I came in to her room. He explained that Tessie had selective amnesia. She didn't know what was happening to her. As far as they knew her brain was coping with the lost of space by immersing her into what I knew was me and her favorite story. Tessie knew everything there was to know about Lewis Carrol's Alice in Wonderland. She loved it. Nonsense was her forte; anything that didn't make sense really. So far all the help at the hospital had a part to play in her minds game. Her nurse, was Queen Ivory of the White Castle. Her doctor the White king. Ironically her nurse and her doctor are married in real life. Her extended family took the places of the other characters. Except apparently me, my best friend Mark, and Mark's cousin Macie. Tessie herself thinks that she's Alice. It wasn't till I saw her that realized why everyone is who they are in her mind. When we were small. We would role play Alice in wonderland. She was Alice and I was the Mad Hatter. Mark played March Hare. One day he brought over his cousin Macie and she looked so much like a mouse that me and Tessie couldn't help our selves. We made her into the Dormouse. When Tessie's Aunt Verna came to visit she told me to help her prank the woman and the nanny that took care of her Aunt's ugly baby. I made it into a game. Her mean old Aunt was the Duchess from our story. With the cook, and the ugly pig baby in tow. I laugh at the memory. Tessie said we should put black pepper into her Aunt's tea. And we did. She was sneezing like an elephant for almost three hours. The nasty woman never came to visit again, much to the relief of me and Tessie. Her parents had never really been a part of her life. They were too busy to bother with her, so they had relatives and nannies to watch her. When I first met her I asked her to my birthday party. It was wonderland themed, the mad tea party to be exact. We hit it off. I had just moved to England from a little island off the coast of Scotland. She told me that my accent was exactly how she imagined Hatter's to be. We became fast friends. By the time we were 10 we always dressed like our characters. I called her Alice and she called me Reginald Theophillus the 3rd. After a while that was to long and she called me Reggie. There was a wheat field behind my house where we would meet everyday. My father was a rather eccentric man. I always wore his clothes around. Dark green pants rolled up, sky blue top hat lopsided, wood brown shirt with a purple vest falling off my rail-thin body. And of course his old rust orange trench coat. The first time she saw me in that get up she was so happy she kissed me. Smack on the cheek. She blushed so red! Haha! She bought me a red silk bow tie for my 15th birthday.I looked down. Said bow tie was hanging around my neck undone. I sighed. I had grown attached to the eccentric style of my father. I couldn't dress normally if I wanted to, which I didn't, because it reminded me of Her. My Alice. The girl I'd been in love with since the day I met her. The only one who could look at me and see a man. The man I wanted to be, the one I was, and the one I used to be. But still she only saw the good. She didn't know about my family. She met them of course. But they always made an effort to treat me normally in front of her. There was a madness that ran in my family. It was carried by the males and I was my fathers only son. Well I was now. Mother always told me she didn't blame me. But she always treated me different after Zanik disappeared. My little brother when missing right after my madness manifested at age 8. He was five at the time. My madness had been slowly becoming ingrained more obvious.My family never spoke about Zanik with me after he disappeared. It was always implied that they're least blamed me if not held me responsible for him being gone. They didn't love me. They never treated me like I was a person; like I was their son. I was a desperate child, longing to be loved. I just wanted to have someone, anyone, love me. For me. Not because they needed to. Or because they liked my face, or family. But because they knew me. That was my Alice. My sweet angel in blue. She kept me stable through the rough times. Strengthening me when everything went wrong. She was so trusting of me. When I told her that I was mad. That I was crazy. She laughed. She threw her arms around me and put her nose against me. "All the best people are" she whispered. I never forgot that. She didn't believe that I was anything but perfect. Then puberty hit. I laugh aloud at the thought. We were so confused when that happened. She was a head taller then me for 4 years. Once we hit 16 I shot up. In all the wrong places. My legs were easily compared with those of a giraffe. My arms dangled. I was skinny as hell. But by that time I was spending most of my time with Alice. I didn't care what girls thought of me. Alice helped me get it together. Hygiene. Need I say more?

I basically lived at her house. She had a room for me, a couple doors down from hers. She had clothes for me in the closet. Things that we had found around town that fit my style.

I remember some nights she would crawl into my bed, her mind frought with nightmares. She would snuggle up to my chest and cry into my neck. Quiet sobs sounding, she would ask me to sing to her. I had never thought of myself as any musical genius but my Alice loved my voice, and that was enough for me.

Her favorite was a gentle song I had learned from the radio.

"Stay With Me" by Taron Egerton. She loved it. I would sing it softly so as to not wake the house, until she was asleep. I couldn't bear to wake her up. So I would let her sleep in my bed. Head on my arm, back against my front countless nights we slept so.

Not often, but occasion my dreams were taken by the madness. I would awaken in a cold sweat to her standing in the doorway. She would smile sadly, and beckon me. Taking my hand to lead me to her room where the sheets were not soaked with sweat. And I would stay with her those nights.

Those days for me had ended only after I left. Then I had been forced to spend the sleepless nights in my office with a cup of tea. The tea that Alice always made me. Chocolate-mint tea. She always said there was a secret ingredient but she would never say what. The tea I made didn't taste the same; close enough to the real thing though, to calm me.

Leaving was her was the worst decision I ever made. But the truth of it is, I didn't leave her.

I always kept tabs on her, even when I was busy. Unbeknownst to most, Dormie, is a bloody genius with electronics. He was able to hack into cameras all over the city. He and I worked to create an algorithm that would project my picture some where near her if any number of things happened. What we didn't think of was when there weren't any cameras.

Mentally, I hit myself. How could I've been so stupid! I knew she went to work on her uncle Liz's roof every Saturday. She's even invited me over a time or two.

But I wasn't thinking.

I figured it out in time though. I rushed to Bill's house, just in time to see her fall. I couldn't...she almost...all because I wasn't there!

I try to swallow the lump that's formed in my throat as I look as her, asleep in her hospital bed.

A broken sob escapes my throat and I stumble out of my chair to her bedside. My brain finally seems to understand how close I came to losing her. Again.

I grasp her hand as I kneel on the floor. Alice. My Alice. I love you. Even if you don't love me. I will protect you with my very life, my love. Tears whisper silently down my freckled cheeks. I kiss her hand, silently praying for her. For a life and world where she is safe, having nothing to fear. I drift off to sleep as I breathe in her intoxicating scent. A sleep full of hopes, wishes, and terrors.


End file.
